Presently, you need two separate accounts with TS for forex & futures. The forex account uses GAIN Capital's platform, futures via TS8 platform (order bar or matrix). The accounts are NOT cross-marginable, which is a pain in the butt.

You cannot auto-execute forex strategies yet, although TS - who have been promising this for years - have recently announced it will be in the next major release (along with Eurex data) "soon", whatever that means.

If fx auto-execution is needed, you can use TradeBolt or Advanz AutoFX, neither of which I have used (I use CME fx futures for automated forex via TS).

So, if you want the equivalent of a Universal account with IB, TS does not yet offer it.

Best is to have accounts with both : TS charting remains by far the best I've seen and is free (less rt data fees) with 10 futures trades a month. IB is the best brokerage in my limited experience (account there almost 10 years).

HTH.

J.

Edit : the GAIN platform is fine for longer term trading, hopeless for faster intraday trading : it's one of those Java-based web-platform contraptions.

Presently, you need two separate accounts with TS for forex & futures. The forex account uses GAIN Capital's platform, futures via TS8 platform (order bar or matrix). The accounts are NOT cross-marginable, which is a pain in the butt.

You cannot auto-execute forex strategies yet, although TS - who have been promising this for years - have recently announced it will be in the next major release (along with Eurex data) "soon", whatever that means.

If fx auto-execution is needed, you can use TradeBolt or Advanz AutoFX, neither of which I have used (I use CME fx futures for automated forex via TS).

So, if you want the equivalent of a Universal account with IB, TS does not yet offer it.

Best is to have accounts with both : TS charting remains by far the best I've seen and is free (less rt data fees) with 10 futures trades a month. IB is the best brokerage in my limited experience (account there almost 10 years).